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The Rise of Community Mass Media: Some Implications for Classic Media Theory

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Established community mass media sectors in Australasia, Europe and the Americas alongside emerging sectors in the UK, India and Africa, signal a transformation in the global mediasphere. This growth of community mass media presents interesting challenges to the ways in which we have typically approached the media. Generally mass media is conceptualized using various combinations of the 'holy trinity' of analysis: political economy, textual analysis and audience reception. Drawing on empirical research conducted in Australia, this paper investigates and assesses community mass media using the 'holy trinity'. This process reveals the trials and triumphs of local media especially its capacity to produce outcomes for the most marginalized groups in Australian society and elsewhere. At the current historical juncture, community mass media is growing exponentially both locally and internationally. The challenges this change brings to the way in which we think and theorise media in the 21st Century is the focus of this chapter.